Common Pieces
by ktwontwo
Summary: A series of short one shots set in the Piece of 8 AU. These are bits of narrative in a variety of styles that explain everything you never even thought you might want to know about this crazy meld of One Piece and Sherlock in space.
1. New Londinium Orbital

**Title:** Common Pieces

 **Summary:** One-shots set in the Piece of Eight universe. These are bits of narrative in a variety of styles containing everything you never wanted to know about this crazy AU-Space melded universe of Sherlock and Once Piece. In short, this is a parking place for various tidbits of history and world building but don't let that turn you off because most of these will be more story-like than a true meta.

 **Parings:** None yet

 **Disclaimer:** I own no rights, I make no profit. Created solely for the amusement of myself and any readers who might happen upon it.

* * *

 **A History of the Londinium L4 Orbital Outpost**

 **(An Excerpt from a document produced by the Greater London Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Board.)**

The Londinium L4 Orbital Outpost, London for short, is unique among orbitals and the reason can be summed up in a single word: History. Londinium was one of the first worlds identified for settlement in the initial wave of the mega-corp colonization efforts. This was the era of fleet based colonization where a group of large ships would jump into a system with everything needed to set up colony, orbital and all, along with the company people to staff it and the colonists to inhabit the planetary outpost. The colonists and orbital staff would live on the ships until a rudimentary orbiting platform was built and then shuttle the materials and people for the new colony down to the surface of the planet. Eventually all the colonists would relocate to the planet, the company would complete the orbital and trade would commence. At that point the lion's share of the profits would be siphoned by the mega-corp for upward of five hundred years to pay off the debt the colonists incurred to the company for the initial capital outlay. Some of the colonies in this situation eventually worked themselves free while others became more indebted as time went on due to purchasing upgrades and amenities. Neither of those scenarios happened with Londinium.

The first problem the proto-colonists found upon hitting system was that the company probes which had identified the planet as suitable for habitation were wrong. The probes it turned out had a flaw in their programing which, as the result of a misplaced decimal point, labeled the water on Londinium as fully potable when in fact long term use and exposure to such water would result in heavy metal poisoning in humans. This left the company employees in somewhat of a dilemma. They had been tasked with setting up an orbital to serve a colony but they couldn't put a colony on the surface of the planet because it would kill the colonists within 30-40 years of exposure. No colonists meant no exports and no exports meant no profit. This was an unacceptable situation for everyone so the best and the brightest sat down, put their heads together and came up with a solution that served almost everyone's purposes except the mega-corp which had sponsored the venture in the first place.

What they ended up doing was to place the orbital in the more stable L4 point rather than the simple geosynchronous orbit that most orbitals occupied. While it would take more energy to shuttle up from the planet overall the energy saved by not having to constantly correct the orbital's course around the planet was vital for what came next. The orbital itself was seriously old style, consisting of what looked like a set of ancient wagon wheels with spokes connected to each other by a central core. The whole thing rotated such that grav-generators were not needed in the outer edge of the structure. What the colonist and orbital staff proceeded to do was cannibalize the ships and colonization supplies and start to fill in between the spokes of each wheel and in between the wheels structures themselves. When they were done they had a hodge podge vaguely can-shaped satellite with enough space to house the entire colonial contingent. They used a good portion of the central hub and extra space to create an entity that was mostly self-sufficient both biologically and economically.

During the same time period another group of engineers and chemists put their minds to the problem of the heavy-metal laden water of Londinium itself. Their solution involved liquid-liquid extraction of the metallic and other compounds suspended in solution. End result was a highly specialized mining operation that put out clean water as well as a variety of useful minerals and mineral byproducts. All of this was accomplished in a relatively short amount of time such that when the first mega-corp ship showed up to inspect the new colony they encountered something completely unexpected.

The mega-corp ship was met not with a proto-colony ripe and ready for exploitation but a united group of pioneers who had managed to make the best out of an untenable situation and had bonded over the experience. They were not longer divided as company and colonist, they were inhabitants of London and were ready willing and able to tell the mega-corp just what they thought of the original mistake. It was also a happy coincidence that among the colonists there happened to be one of the most preeminent retired jurists in the known galaxy named Holmes and among the company contingent a bright young lawyer with the surname Vernet. Together these two came up with a legal strategy using the mega-corp's faulty information to tie up the status of the colony in litigation for over two decades. At the end of that time Londinium owned itself and was becoming one of the first truly independent colonies.

The mega-corp involved was none too pleased with this result and plans were in the works to rectify the situation by force when fate took a hand in the form of the great data corruption. History tells us of the horrors unleashed on the unsuspecting galaxy when the anarchy group Anonymous unleashed a modified computer virus specifically aimed at the mega-corps and managed to take them down. Unfortunately in the process the virus mutated infecting other computer systems including a number of those owned by the governmental bodies overseeing the corporate sector. While this in effect ended the era of the mega-corps it also meant that many of the colonies that had been funded by such corporations became _lost_ as the navigational information had been held as trade secret information. The colonies that were _company planets_ were found relatively quickly since there were quite a few starships which still had the navigation information unaffected by the data crash. The independent colonies were a different matter altogether and many, Londinium among them, remained _lost_ for over 400 years.

In fact, Londinium might not have been rediscovered so quickly if it hadn't been for a cat, his two graduate student owners and a thesis. One of the two students was an economist doing his thesis about the economic demise of the mega-corps and attempting to determine if such corporations could have remained economically viable if the great data corruption had not occurred. In amongst his research was the court case dissolving the colonization contract and giving Londinium its financial independence. The research itself was primarily hard copy and over time had ended up piled all over their shared living quarters. One day the cat allegedly knocked several of the piles over creating even more of a mess. The other graduate student happened to be an astrophysicist who had previously served on a corporate starship as a rated astrogater. She was a fastidious sort and in the process of sorting the paperwork came across a familiar looking numerical sequence which just happened to be the coordinates for Londinium. (FN1 The bounty for discovery of a "lost" colony enabled the two grad students to pay off all their loans, become domestic partners and keep the cat in lavish style for the rest of all their lives.)

Upon discovery of the coordinates the Galactic Federation sent a contact ship to see what, if anything had become of the colony. They did not have high hopes given the elapsed time period and the results of previous expeditions to similarly lost colonies. The initial re-contact ship was quite pleased to find not just a thriving outpost but The Commonwealth of New Britannia, a set of five related star systems which had been all colonized in turn from Londinium.

There were, of course, some rather strange social quirks which had developed over the interim period. The most minor of these quirks was the propensity of the populace to consume a beverage made by pouring hot water over certain dried plant matter. The most difficult for the contact group to comprehend was the local governmental system. It seems the Commonwealth of New Britannia was officially a constitutional monarchy ruled from London. Each planet in in the commonwealth it seemed had its own parliamentary democracy but all of them acknowledged as their titular head a monarch who happened to be located in London. The diplomats received welcome in the name of the monarch, which at that time happened to be known as _King William_ , and negotiated treaties with various functionaries of _the crown_. It was only after a number of trips and discussions regarding the reintegration of the Commonwealth into galactic society and trade that the diplomats learned that _King William_ was in actuality the computer core AI that controlled the L4 orbital.

It took a while for the Galactic Federation diplomats to find a local source who could explain exactly how this particular governmental system had happened but they eventually discovered that the reason was entirely practical. The last information the Bretons, as the citizens of Londinium and the Commonwealth liked to call themselves, had received about the Galactic Federation was from a ship that managed to escape from Federation space just as the full effects of the Great Data Crash were beginning to be known but before the virus had mutated and infected most of the space going vessels. From that information and the lack of subsequent ships the Bretons assumed, and rightly so, that the Galactic Federation had either collapsed or was so damaged that they were going to be effectively on their own. That set off their own exploration and colonization efforts which eventually resulted in the settlement and development of the Commonwealth systems. It also brought them into contact with an amphibious race of beings colloquially known as _Fishmen._ (FN2 This reference term was adopted for the simple reason that the actual name by which the Fishmen designated their specie happened to be a series of clicks and whistles which were mostly pitched above the range of human hearing.) The Fishmen were a highly stratified, quasi-feudal society and did not understand or trust persons or entities without some sort of hereditary leader. The Bretons, seeing a simple way to encourage their new neighbor's trust and trade created a fictitious monarch who delegated all authority to the parliamentary system. (FN3 No one is quite sure exactly when the fictitious monarch's name was attached to the orbital AI but once it was the populace quickly adopted it and the government soon followed.) To keep up the ruse the Government had to change monarchs from time to time. Once again practicality was invoked and the Bretons decided that whenever the AI core is substantially changed, as determined by a complicated algorithm, the computer engineers declare that the old monarch is "dead" and there is a "new" monarch. (FN4 Of course this provides an excellent excuse for a Commonwealth wide party every 50-70 stan-years.)

Due to its history and intermittent bursts of construction London is more like a planetary city than an orbital in nature. In fact it is more akin to the ancient concept of an archology than it is to a space station. Most orbitals are sleek cylindrical shapes with a girding of docks all around the center. London on the other hand looks something like a dozen bagels threaded onto a sausage. There are docks protruding from the midmost bagel but due to the sheer size of the structure they don't continue all the way around. In fact, the London docks happen to be at four opposing points. The North and South docks are set up to handle the large freighters and heavier commercial vessels while the East and West docks are set up to handle smaller craft with the East being primarily commercial and the West being passenger and private craft.

Another difference is organizational. In a standard orbital the decks above the docks are numbered with ordinal ascending numbers and contain living quarters, high-end entertainment, retail, and office space. The decks below the docks are all prefaced with 0 and tend to have commercial ventures, entertainment that caters to the space faring crowd and the infrastructure needed to keep the station habitable. London on the other hand seems to have no such organization. The city is divided into sectors. (FN5 The sectors were named after various districts in the greater London metropolitan area on ancient Earth. Corridors and pass ways were likewise given names that corresponded to Old Earth London streets.) Each sector has its own power grid, environmental and other support structures although they are all tied together into a unified network. Most sectors also have a mix of business, residential and commercial. In case of an emergency a sector could be sealed off and survive quite handily on its own for quite a few stan-days.

The third and most unique difference between London and other orbitals other than sheer size is the composition and use of the hub, the sausage like structure upon which bisects the bagel-like bumps. The hub is a huge open area containing parks, hydroponic farms and even a river system running all the way from one end to the other. (FN6 Continuing with the general nomenclature the largest of these rivers was rather quickly christened The Thames.) A relatively thin straw-like structure containing mirrors, photovoltaics and heat exchange generation systems runs through its center providing additional power to the station as a whole. This structure allows light from Londinium's star to penetrate to even the center of the station. Panels were opened and closed at intervals to provide diurnal cycles and allow the plants to grow in a more natural manner. The only drawback to this system was caused by the size of hub itself and the prevalence of open water and plant material. From time to time the entire station environmental system would get slightly out of balance for one reason or another resulting in fog. Thus London is unique among orbitals in that it has its own weather systems.

The complexity and intricacy of the interconnected infrastructure required a rather complex and sophisticated computer system to keep things up and running. The Bretons discovered rather early on that they did not have the staffing necessary to keep a human eye on everything that needed to be monitored. This is why the AI for London was developed in the first place, to control and monitor the systems and alert the humans if something had gone awry. Over time the AI became more and more integrated with the subsystems of the station and by the time it was named as the monarch it was arguably the most advanced AI in the entire galaxy. (FN7 Some of the current engineers that work with the current monarch, Queen Victoria, will assert when inebriated that the AI could not only pass the ancient Turing test but that it is in effect a self-aware fully conscious entity in its own right. Of course this is officially considered an urban myth.) This unique setup places London at the forefront of computer technology as well as making it one of the most stable, secure and safe orbitals in known space.

Despite, or more likely, because of its unique status London is highly amenable to both tourists and business alike. It is a highly cosmopolitan and diverse metropolis with something that will cater to most every taste imaginable. From cultural offerings like theatre, music, art and historical museums to the vast collection of the New Britannia Library the intellectual life of the city compares favorably with that of the oldest of the worlds in the Galactic Federation. Likewise the business climate is highly favorable due to the burgeoning high-tech industry and balanced raw material base provided both in-system and throughout the Commonwealth. Strategically placed for easy starship access to both the inner Galactic Federation as well as the frontier areas, London provides a stable base for trading and launching explorative ventures into the unknown and little known areas in and around the gravitational anomaly known as the Grand Line. For further information regarding current opportunities in London please feel free to contact the Greater London Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Board who will be happy to field your inquiries.

* * *

 **Author's Notes:** Many thanks must be given to Kneoria/Erif_of_Taloma (on and AO3 respectively) who asked me to beta read _What are the Odds_ which introduced me to the craziness that is _Once Piece_ and caused my muse to fall in love with Marco the Phoenix. She then handed me a cute fluffy plot bunny along with an event to post it in (opscifiandfantasy – lunarshores on tumbler) which resulted in _The Universe is Rarely So Lazy_. The next thing I knew I had a whole host of plot bunnies hopping around the orbital, stealing starships and generally insisting on being written. Of course this, like all AU's and crossovers required the development of a certain amount of backstory to combine the two fandoms. While I normally do this via timelines, character rosters and scribbled notes this particular AU demanded something more and you are looking at the result.

The influences on this AU are varied and numerous. Of course _Once Piece_ and Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes tales, with all of the retellings up to and including the BBC's _Sherlock_ , are the base fandoms. However, ensconced herein are bits of _Star Trek_ as well as allusions to _James Bond_ , _Harry Potter_ , and _Alice in Wonderland_ to name just a few. Stylistically much of this owes homage to Nathan Lowell's _Trader's Tales From the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper_ , Anthony Ryan's _Slab City Blues_ stories, and Douglas Adam's _Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy._ The Sci-Fi channel series _The Expanse_ and _Killjoys_ were also influential. If you want to know where a particular bit of something came from please feel free to ask.


	2. Th' History o' the Grand Line

**Title:** Common Pieces

 **Summary:** One-shots set in the Piece of Eight universe. These are bits of narrative in a variety of styles containing everything you never wanted to know about this crazy AU-Space melded universe of Sherlock and Once Piece. In short, this is a parking place for various tidbits of history and world building but don't let that turn you off because most of these will be more story-like than a true meta.

 **Parings:** None yet

 **Disclaimer:** I own no rights, I make no profit. Created solely for the amusement of myself and any readers who might happen upon it.

* * *

 **The History o' the Grand Line**

 _Originally titled "Everythin' Ye Need t' Know About the History o' the Grand Line" this is a transcription of a recording made as part of the Galactic Oral History Project, New Londinium University. Aaron Galfrant made this recording in a bar on the planet known as High in the Tortuga system of the Grand Line. The transcribers have made a valiant attempt to render the patois of the original speaker in written form. We apologize if this causes difficulties._

So, ya' want to know 'bout the Grand Line do you? Now that thar's a long tale and mighty thirsty work. Oh, I see you've provided libations and t' good stuff at that. What did you have t' bribe t' barkeep with t' have him…on second thought I don't think I want t' know. Pull up a chair, pour me a drink and I'll tell you everythin' you need t' know.

This tale starts long ago, in the early days o' explorin' the galaxy. Seekin' out new planets and findin' new ways t' get places was awful expensive. That's why the only folks who were in the exploration business were governments and big bucks corporations. o' course the corps did the heavy liftin' cause the monetary rewards for them if they found a planet t' exploit far outweighed the heavy cost o' mountin' a search.

Now in them days this kind o` exploration be done by sendin` ou' a ship t` the end o` known an' mapped space. They'd sit on the edge o` whateresystem on the aft side o` beyond an' send ou' a bunch o` probes. Them probes be wee more than a jump drive an' a set o` sensors. They be programmed t` fold space a predetermined amount, look around, an' jump aft. The crew o` the exploration ship would eyeball the info returned then tweak the next batch t` eyeball whaterewas interestin`. Now jumpin` blind, which be what these probes be doin`, be a dangerous business an' nay all o` 'em survived. Between what came aft an' what didn't come aft the explorers would git a good idee o' what be ahead o' them. Once they had enough information they'd jump into the most promisin' o' the new systems, map 't an' then start the whole process all o'er again.

Now thar be a couple o' corps that be explorin' ou' in this end o' the Galaxy an' they started gettin' all sorts o' strange results from the'r probes. They'd send the'r wee darlin's off an' like usual some would come aft an' others wouldn't. But in this case some came aft nay 'ere they'd port off but from somewhere else entirely. Other times two probes sent launched from the exact same place would come aft wi' completely unique information or one would come aft but the other wouldn't.

After a large amount o' hade scratchin' an' a goodly amount o' swearin' some bstarboard thin' figured ou' what be causin' the anomalous results. This particular region o' space had a long nebula anchored between two black holes. The resultin' gravitational fluxes meant that jump points in this area did nay stay stable fer long. The nebula itself had a distinctly red coloration when viewed from afar so the area be duly marked on the star maps an' named the Red Line.

Once the reason fer the disappearance o' the probes be discovered the two main corps who be explorin' the area tookst completely different approaches t' dealin' wi' 't. One started carefully findin' the wee stable jump points in each system an' linkin' them one t' another like pearls on a strin'. The other jus' gave up the gravitational anomaly as a bad job, sailed' around 't an' started settlin' an area now controlled by the Collective Worlds.

Then the great data crash happened. The series o' colonies on the other side o' the Grand Line be suddenly on the'r own when the'r foundin' corp sailed' down. They banded together an' eventually developed into the Collective Worlds as we know them today. The other corporation be still mostly in exploration mode an' when 't collapsed 't simply port a set o' exploratory ships cut off. Most o' these ships ended up in New Britannia but one did nay. This particular ship, named _the Beagle_ I think, had a crazy ship captain an' a very strong jump pilot. The pilot allegedly could alter a jump enough t' miss practically anythin' in the way. Anyhow, this ship strung together a series o' jumps goin' all the way t' The Red Line an' beyond. In the process they discovered a number o' habitable worlds as well as some alien races includin' the Fishmen. On accoun' o' the stable jump points be wee an' far between an' they tended t' jus' go on or aft t' the next system in line the systems in sequence became known as the Grand Line.

Now, now; don't ye go runnin' off halfcocked. That thar be only the beginnin' o' the tale. By the time the rest o' the Galaxy recovered an' found our sector again the systems on the Grand Line be settled an' the Collective Worlds be expandin'. O' course one o' the areas into which they wanted t' expand be the Grand Line. Why ye ask? Well gi'en that each world had only two, an' the rare one three, safe jump points if ye controlled a system then ye controlled the trade down the entire line.

The settlers o' the Line be nay terribly happy about the possibility o' bein' annexed into the Collective Worlds. They liked the'r homeport grown governments an' easy goin' tradin' culture. Annexation would impose a whole set o' rules, regulations an' tariffs set by strange outsiders wi' nay real understandin' o' local conditions. The shippers who sailed the Line be also nay terribly pleased an' they started obstructin' the Collective Worlds in any way they could t' protect the'r way o' life. O'er time these traders adopted an old earth symbol, the Jolly Roger, t' indicate the'r opposition. O' course the Collective Worlds retaliated an' labeled all who sailed under such a Jolly Roger as Pirates whether or nay they actively committed acts o' sweet trade in the space lanes. Fer a long time thar be a stalemate between the Collective Worlds an' the Spacefarin' heartys. Control o' specific systems would change hands now an' again but generally the Line belonged t' the Space Dogs an' the Collective Worlds controlled the'r own space.

Now this changed relatively recently an' as the result o' one man, Gol D. Roger. Roger be a buccanneer who sailed up an' down the Grand Line seemingly at will. Nay one knew how he did 't but he'd appear an' disappear seemingly like magic. He actively opposed the Collective Worlds an' be declared an outlaw wi' a high price on his hade on accoun' o' it.

Some 25 stan-yrs ago 't be when the Collective Worlds finally caught Roger. They sentenced the lad's t' Davy Jones' locker an' broadcast the execution t' all an' sundry. That proved t' be somewhat o' a mistake on accoun' o' Roger gave a speech. He spake that the reason he'd been so successful all them voyages be due t' a great booty he'd found when he be young. 't be called the One Piece an' he spake he'd hidden 't somewhere in the Grand Line. He charged all the Space dogs o' the Line t' go find 't an' t' oppose the Collective Worlds in all things.

Now from that tide t' this sea dogs an' land lubbers on the Line be lookin' fer the Once Piece. Nay one really knows what 'tis. Some say 't's a map wi' the coordinates o' all the unstable jump points an' notes on how t' use them safely; others say 't's a new type o' ship drive; still others think 't's actually an alien lifeform that looks like stuffed green spotted alligator that can pilot a ship anywhere but only says one word in common. As fer me I don't think 't's any o' them things. Nay, I think 't's old, real old, Old Earth old. I think 't's a compass. Ye know them things that be havin' a needle in 'em that points t' the magnetic pole on a planet? Aye, only this one don't point t' a magnetic pole, nay this one points t' nothin' less than the way t' yer heart's desire.

You don't b'lieve me do ye? Ah, well then let me tell ye a tale from the days 'ere mighty ships o' wood an' iron sailed on the oceans o' Old Earth. 'T's a tale o' a ship known as _The Pearl_ …

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Ahoy mates, here be plot bunnies and fandom referents. Some of 'em are obvious, others not. Please be making your opinions known about this here piece of word building. Comments, constructive criticism and suggestions are all welcome to dock in this here port o' call.


	3. Why Shifters & Psychics Don't Get Along

**Title:** Common Pieces

 **Summary:** One-shots set in the Piece of Eight universe. These are bits of narrative in a variety of styles containing everything you never wanted to know about this crazy AU-Space melded universe of Sherlock and Once Piece. In short, this is a parking place for various tidbits of history and world building but don't let that turn you off because most of these will be more story-like than a true meta.

 **Parings:** None yet

 **Disclaimer:** I own no rights, I make no profit. Created solely for the amusement of myself and any readers who might happen upon it.

* * *

 **Why Shifters and Psychics Don't Get Along  
** **(Attributed to R. Kipling II)** **  
**

Once upon a time when the children of men lived all on a small planet halfway down an arm of the great spiral galaxy there were three kinds of people. There were those who were clever with their hands, those who were clever with their minds and those who were clever with their forms. In those times, oh Best Beloved, no one could tell any of the kinds apart until they used their gifts. Those who were clever with their hands used tools to build things, those who were clever with their minds manipulated the elements of the world and those who where clever with their forms changed into other animals.

For a long, long, time this was just the way of things until people with each type of gift became jealous of the others. So the powers that be in those times said "take each gift and cleave to yourselves no longer live together." The elders and the leaders of the people knew that this was good advice and did so. The ones who were clever with their hands called themselves Human and went one way. Those who were clever with their minds called themselves Fae and went another. Those who were clever with their forms called themselves Shifters and they stayed put.

Time went along, as it is want to do, and the three kinds lived separate each with their own. They would visit occasionally and engage in commerce, especially to obtain things made by the clever handed ones, but the groups remained apart. This separation by kind did not last forever. Humankind was prolific and grew fast and strong. They started taking more area to live on and eventually began hunting Fae and Shifters to gain more land. So the Fae and the Shifters hid themselves away in the secret places of the world and didn't interact much with Humankind anymore.

This state of affairs remained for ever so long until a leader of the Shifters noticed a problem. His form was that of a wolf and his name was Fenrir. He realized that there were fewer and fewer kits and pups and fledglings in his clan every year. So Fenrir took a journey to see Oberon, King of the Fae.

When he arrived he was treated kindly and ushered in to see the King.

"Oh King," Fenrir said, "I have noticed that there are fewer and fewer shifter kits and pups and fledglings each year. I have also noticed," because Fenrir had been alert on his travels, "that your people are less numerous than before. Do you know why this is and what we can do about it?"

Oberon put his chin in his hand and furrowed his brow. "Let me think on this," he said and dismissed Fenrir to the care of his court.

Fenrir stayed in the court of Oberon and each week he returned before the King and asked his question and each time Oberon would say, "Let me think on this."

Now Fenrir was treated as a privileged guest. He had access to all the accumulated knowledge of the Fae and could talk with the wise as he wished. So after a few weeks he began reading the lore and consulting the wise and finally one day he understood what the problem was and what needed to be done.

That week when he stood before the King he did not ask his question. Instead he said, "Oh King, I have looked through your lore and consulted your wise and I think this problem is not unknown to you. It is an issue of genetic diversity and because we have lived apart from humankind for so long our blood has mingled too closely and become weak."

Oberon put his chin in his hand but said nothing.

Fenrir carried on, "I think we must go live among the humans and interbreed with them to save our gifts."

Oberon grew wroth at these words, "My people are not weak," he yelled. "Get you from my court you mangy cur," for Oberon knew Fenrir's other form, "and never show your face to ask for help again!"

So Fenrir left and went back to his people. The Shifters used the knowledge he had gained and started to infiltrate the human settlements to live among them. They eschewed their other forms the better to hide and pretend to be human. After a long while it became so the blood of the shifters and the humans were intermingled to the point that only a very few could change their form. In fact, in each new generation there were fewer and fewer who had the gift until finally none at all were able to do so.

The Fae, on the other hand, began stealing humans to strengthen their blood line. This was not enough and when Oberon passed beyond his wife Tatianna decreed that the Fae would also hide amongst the humans. The Fae used their minds to hide and like the Shifters integrated into human society. Once again fewer and fewer had the power in each successive generation until the ability was gone.

Years and years and years upon years passed. Humankind forgot the Fae and the Shifters as anything but stories told to children. The clever handed ones became numerous and strong. They built great ships to travel their world and finally ships to travel the stars. Out in the stars, oh Best Beloved, is where this tale becomes interesting.

Humankind went to the stars and lived on the worlds they found there. As they adjusted to those worlds some of that old dormant genetic material left over from the Shifters and the Fae became active. No one knows quite how this occurred but on some worlds the Fae blood woke up and people became Psychic. They were able to move and shape elements with their minds. Strangely it was not only the original powers that occurred but some could speak mind to mind while others see thing afar or in the future. On other worlds the Shifter blood dominated and people could change into animals. Like the Fae powers it was not just normal every day animals but also some species which had not been seen since the days of old Earth.

Now Humankind had learned a thing or two over the long years and they just considered these changes adaptations akin to the changes that happen when humans live in low gravity or high gravity for generations. They decreed that all people be treated as people albeit some with different skills and gifts than others. This was all well and good until someone noticed that those who could shift and those who could psychically alter their world most times did not get along too well together. There were exceptions, but in general the two types of gifts preferred to remain apart if at all possible.

This separation has continued to this very day much to the chagrin of the humans who would very much like to have Psychics and Shifters working in tandem. However to you, oh my Best Beloved, I will tell the truth. Shifters don't like Psychics because all those years ago Oberon refused to help Fenrir and Psychics don't like Shifters because all those years ago Fenir was right.

 _Those who change to fur and feathers,  
_ _Do not with Psychics get together.  
I_ _t's not because they cannot whelp,  
_ _It's because their King refused to help.  
_ _It's not because Shifters need to fight,  
_ _It's because old Fenrir was right!_

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Rudyard Kipling, while a man of his day with all the prejudices and proclivities of his era, IMHO is one of the best writers of prose that reads like poetry. It's evident in all his writing but it comes to full fruition in the Just So Stories. This is my attempt at doing the same.


End file.
